Exit polls are surveys conducted in selected voting precincts that are chosen to represent the overall state voting population demographic. Voters are randomly selected as they leave the precinct polling booth and asked to complete a survey form indicating 1) who they just voted for, 2) how they voted in the previous election, 3) income range, 4) age group, 5) party-id (Democrat, Republican, Independent), 6) philosophy (liberal, moderate, conservative), and many other questions.

In this analysis we consider the most important question: who did you vote for? Having this information, we calculate the discrepancy between the state exit poll and the recorded vote count. Note that respondents are not asked to provide personal information. There is no excuse for not releasing exit poll/voting results for each of the 1400+ exit poll precincts. There is no privacy issue.

Key results

– Republican presidential vote shares exceeded the corresponding unadjusted exit poll shares in 232 of the 274 state elections for which there is exit poll data. The probability that 232 would red-shift to the Republicans is ZERO. One would normally expect that approximately 137 would shift to the Republicans.

– Of the 274, there were 55 state elections in which Republicans won the vote and the Democrats won the exit poll. Conversely, the Republicans lost only two elections (Iowa and Minnesota in 2000) in which they won the exit poll. The probability of this occurrence is virtually ZERO. If the elections were fair, the number of flips would be nearly equal.

– The exit poll margin of error (described below) was exceeded in 135 of the 274 polls. The probability is ZERO. The statistical expectation is that the margin of error (MoE) would be exceeded in 14 polls (5%).

– 131 of the 135 exit polls in which the MoE was exceeded moved to the recorded vote in favor of the Republican (“red shift”). There is a ZERO probability that the one-sided shift was due to chance. It is powerful evidence beyond any doubt of pervasive systemic election fraud.

Basic Statistics and the True Vote ModelThe True Vote Model (TVM) is based on current and previous election votes cast (Census), voter mortality and returning voter turnout. Published National Exit Poll (NEP) vote shares were applied to new and returning voters. The TVM closely matched the corresponding unadjusted exit polls in each election. It shows that the exit poll discrepancies were primarily due to implausible and/or impossible adjustments required to force the NEP to match the recorded vote. The exit polls were forced to match the recorded votes by adjusting the implied number of returning voters from the previous election. These adjustments are clearly indicated by the percentage mix of returning voters in the current election..

The bedrock of statistical polling analysis is the Law of Large Numbers. As the number of observations in a survey increases, the average will approach the theoretical mean value. For instance, in coin flipping, as the number of flips increase, the average percentage of heads will approach the theoretical 50% mean value.

The Normal distribution is considered the most prominent probability distribution in statistics (“the bell curve”). It is used throughout statistics, natural sciences, and social sciences as a simple model for complex phenomena. For example, the observational error in an election polling is usually assumed to follow a normal distribution, and uncertainty is computed using this assumption. Note that a normally-distributed variable has a symmetric distribution about its mean.

The Binomial distribution calculates the probability P that a given number of events (successes) would occur in n trials given that each trial has a constant probability p of success. For instance, the probability of flipping heads (a success) is 50%.

The Poisson distribution calculates the probability of a series of events in which each event has a very low probability. For instance, there is a 5% (1 in 20) probability that the recorded vote share will differ from the exit poll beyond the MoE.

The Binomial distribution converges towards the Poisson as the number of trials (n) approaches infinity while the product (np) remains fixed (p is the probability). Therefore the Poisson distribution with parameter λ = np can be used as an approximation to the Binomial distribution B(n,p) if n is sufficiently large and p sufficiently small.

The exit poll margin of error is based on the number of respondents and the “cluster effect” (assumed as 0.30). The Margin of Error Calculator illustrates the effects of sample size and poll share on the margin of error and corresponding win probability.

Impossible 2004 National Exit Poll

This is how the 2004 National Exit Poll was forced to match the recorded vote. Kerry won the state exit poll aggregate (76,000 respondents) by 51.1-47.5% (3.6% margin). The 2004 National Exit Poll (NEP) is a subset of the state polls. The unadjusted NEP showed that Kerry won by a 4.8% margin. But the NEP was adjusted to match the recorded vote with nearly 6 million more returning Bush 2000 voters than were alive in 2004. Bush had 50.5 million recorded votes in 2000. Approximately 2.5 million died, so there were at most 48 million returning Bush voters. But not all returned to vote.

Assuming 98% of living Bush 2000 voters turned out in 2004, then there were 47 million returning Bush voters or 38.4% of the 122.3 million who voted. But according to the adjusted NEP, there were 52.6 million returning Bush voters (43% of the voters). There is a major disconnect here; we have just shown that there were approximately 47 million.

So where did the 5.6 (52.6-47) million Bush voters come from? The bottom line: In order to adjust the National Exit Poll to conform to the recorded vote, there had to be 5.6 million phantom Bush voters. Therefore since the adjusted exit poll was impossible, so was the recorded vote.

Ohio 2004 presidential election
Bush won the recorded vote by 50.8-48.7% (119,000 vote margin). In the exit poll, 2020 voters were sampled, of whom 1092 voted for Kerry (54.1%) and 924 for Bush (45.7%). There was a 10.6% discrepancy in margin between the poll and the vote. Given the exit poll result, we can calculate the probability that a) Kerry won the election and b) of Bush getting his recorded vote share.

The Ohio exit poll MoE was 2.8% which means there is a 95.4% probability that Kerry’s True Vote was within 2.8% of his exit poll share (between 51.3% and 56.9%) and a 97.5% probability that it was at least 51.3%. The Normal distribution calculates a 99.8% probability that Kerry won Ohio.P = 99.8% = Normdist (.541,.500,.028/1.96, true)

Bush won Ohio with a 50.8% recorded share – a 5.1% increase (red-shift) over his 45.7% exit poll share. The probability that the 5.1% shift was due to chance is 1 in 4852 (.02%). So which most closely represented how the True Vote: the exit poll or the recorded vote?

1988 presidential election
Just 24 state exit polls are listed for 1988 on the Roper Center site, which comprised 68.7 million (75%) of the 91.6 million national recorded votes. Dukakis led the 24-poll aggregate by 51.6-47.3%. Bush won the corresponding recorded vote by 52.3-46.8%, a 9.8% discrepancy. The exit poll MoE was exceeded in 11 of the 24 states – all in favor of Bush (see the summary statistics below).

Dukakis won the unadjusted National Exit Poll by 49.8-49.2%, but Bush won the recorded vote by 53.4-45.6%, a 7 million vote margin. According to the Census, 102.2 million votes were cast and 91.6 million recorded, therefore a minimum of 10.6 million ballots were uncounted. Dukakis had approximately 8 million (75%) of the uncounted votes (see below). That may be one of the reasons why Dukakis won the state and national exit polls and lost the recorded vote.

Calculating the probabilities
Given the state recorded vote, exit poll and margin of error for each of 274 elections, we can calculate the probability of the red shift.

The probability P that 55 of 57 exit polls would flip from the Democrats leading in the exit polls to the Republicans winning the recorded vote is given by the Binomial distribution: P= 1-Binomdist(54,57,.5,true)P= 1.13E-14 = 0.000000000000011 or 1 in 88 trillion!

The probability that the exit poll margin of error would be exceeded in any given state is 5% or 1 in 20. Therefore, approximately 14 of the 274 exit polls would be expected to exceed the margin of error, 7 for the Republican and 7 for the Democrat. The Republicans did better in the recorded vote than in the exit polls in 232 of the 274 elections. The probability of this one-sided red-shift is ZERO.

The MoE was exceeded in 131 exit polls in favor of the Republicans. The Poisson spreadsheet function calculates the probability:P = E-116 = Poisson (131, .025*274, false)
The probability is ZERO. There are 115 zeros to the right of the decimal!

Sensitivity AnalysisSensitivity analysis is an important tool for viewing the effects of alternative assumptions on key results from a mathematical model.

In pre-election polls, the margin of error (MoE) is based strictly on the number of respondents. In exit polls, however, a “cluster factor” is added to the calculated MoE. Therefore, the number of states in which the MoE was exceeded in 1988-2008 (and the corresponding probabilities) is a function of the cluster effect.

The MoE was exceeded in 135 of 274 exit polls assuming a 30% “cluster factor” (the base case). Although 30% is the most common estimate, political scientists and statisticians may differ on the appropriate cluster factor to be used in a given exit poll. Therefore, a sensitivity analysis worksheet of various cluster factor assumptions (ranging from 0% to 200%) is displayed in the 1988-2008 Unadjusted Exit Poll Spreadsheet Reference.

The table displays the number of exit polls in which the MoE was exceeded over a range of cluster factors. Even with extremely conservative cluster factor assumptions, the sensitivity analysis indicates a ZERO probability that the margin of error would be exceeded in the six elections. Were the massive discrepancies due to inferior polling by the most experienced mainstream media exit pollsters in the world? Or are they further mathematical confirmation of systemic election fraud – beyond any doubt?

Overwhelming Evidence
The one-sided results of the 375,000 state exit poll respondents over the last six presidential elections leads to only one conclusion: the massive exit poll discrepancies cannot be due to faulty polling and is overwhelming evidence that systemic election fraud has favored the Republicans in every election since 1988.

Fraud certainly cost the Democrats at least two elections (2000, 2004) and likely a third (1988). And in the three elections they won, their margin was reduced significantly by election fraud.

To those who say that quoting these impossible probabilities invites derision, that it is overkill, my response is simply this: those are the actual results that the mathematical functions produced based on public data. The mathematical probabilities need to be an integral part of any election discussion or debate and need to be addressed by media pundits and academics.

Media pollsters, pundits and academics need to do a comparable scientific analysis of historical exit polls and create feasible and plausible True Vote models. Independent journalists need to consider that the devil is in the details of systemic election fraud. They can start by trying to reviewing the analysis presented here. It’s been two years and no one has even tried to debunk it.

1988-2008 Red-shift Summary (274 exit polls)
The following table lists the
a) Number of states in which the exit poll red-shifted to the Republican,
b) Number of states which red-shifted beyond the margin of error,
c) Probability of n states red-shifting beyond the MoE,
d) Democratic unadjusted aggregate state exit poll share,
e) Democratic recorded share,
f) Difference between Democratic exit poll and recorded share.

The Democrats won the exit poll but lost the recorded vote in the following states. The corresponding decline in electoral votes cost the Democrats to lose the 1988, 2000, 2004 elections.

1988 (7): CA IL MD MI NM PA VT
Dukakis’ electoral vote was reduced from 271 in the exit polls to 112 in the recorded vote. The U.S. Vote Census indicated that there were 10.6 million net uncounted votes in 1988. Since only 24 states were exit polled, a proxy equivalent was estimated for each of the other 26 states by allocating 75% of the uncounted votes to Dukakis. The average 3.47% MoE of the 24 exit polls was assumed for each of the 26 states. Four of the 26 flipped to Bush: CO LA MT SD.

The rationale for deriving the estimate is Method 2 of the 1988-2008 True Vote Model in which 75% of uncounted votes were allocated to the Democrat. The resulting 51.6% average Democratic share (see above) exactly matched the unadjusted exit polls (TVM #3). This article by Bob Fitrakis provides evidence that uncounted votes are heavily Democratic.

Your model leaves out Bayesian estimates involving the probability that one chooses to take an exit poll given their particular ideology. If that can be correctly computed, how does that change the results?

No. I do not. I just use the polls. And I do not just accept that the absentee ballots favor the Republicans. Here is some history. In 2008, Obama had 52.4% of the 121 million ballots that were counted on or before Election Day. He had 59% of the 10 million that were counted after Election Day (many of which were absentees).

HonestBalance

November 24, 2012 at 7:23 pm

The statistical analysis here is impressive, but it fails to address one major flaw in almost all statistics that involve exit polling and polling in general; there is an inherent demographic of individuals who willingly choose to take polls and that same demographic tend to lean more Republican/Conservative in nature. That factor alone can account for everything in your model suggesting fraud. If that factor is not taken into account then as impressive as the analysis is, it is meaningless as it does not accurately reflect what is really happening. Also a followup question for thought on voting fraud – what is the probability that in MULTIPLE voting districts of so-called “swing” states containing many thousands of people each, you would have 100.00% of the votes for any one presidential candidate?

If the demographics of voters who “choose” to take the polls lean Republican, then that indicates a Republican bias in pre-election and post election exit polls. Yet the Democrats always do much better in the RV pre-election polls and the unadjusted exit polls than in the recorded vote.

If the GOP bias exists, then it means that the Democrats have done even better than the pre-election Forecast and post-election True Vote Models indicate.

The Democrats won the unadjusted state 1988-2008 presidential exit polls (375,000 total respondents) by 52-42%, but the official recorded margin was reduced to 48-46%. They won the corresponding National Exit polls (90,000 respondents) by the same 52-42%. The True Vote Model confirmed the polls in all six elections. The Democrats won them all.

Consider the final adjusted 2004 National Exit poll which was FORCED (as all are) to match the recorded vote. Bush won by 50.7-48.3%. In order to force the match, the exit pollsters indicated that 43% (52.6 million) of 122 million 2004 voters were returning Bush 2000 voters. But Bush only had 50.5 million RECORDED votes in 2000. Of the 50.5 million, approximately 2.5 million passed on before the 2004 election. That leaves 48 million living Bush 2000 voters. Not all 48 million returned to vote in 2004.

Assume 47 million (98%) returned to vote. The Final National exit poll indicated 52.6 million which is obviously impossible. Therefore, since the Final was FORCED TO MATCH THE RECORDED VOTE COUNT with 110% Bush 2000 living voter turnout in 2004, THE RECORDED VOTE COUNT HAD TO BE IMPOSSIBLE.

The election was stolen. Kerry won a True Vote landslide. The unadjusted exit poll showed he won by 52-47% (6 million votes). The True Vote Model indicates that he won by 67-57 million with 53.5%.

Impossible returning Bush voter turnout is nothing new. It proves election fraud in
1988: 103% Bush 1984 turnout. Dukakis may have won the election. He led the state exit polls by 4% and national exit poll by 1%. There were 11 million net uncounted votes whichare 70-80% Democratic.
1992: 119% Bush 1988 turnout. Clinton won by nearly 16 million, not 6 million recorded votes. There were 10 million net uncounted votes.
1996: Clinton won by 6 million more than his recorded margin. There were 9 million net uncounted.
2000: Gore won by 3-5 million votes more than his 540,000 recorded margin. There were 6 million net uncounted.
2004: 110%: Kerry won by 6-10 million. He did not lose by 3 million.
There were 4 million net uncounted.
2008: 103% required Bush turnout Obama won by 23 million,not the 9.5 million recorded.

The lesson here is this: don’t assume anything about differential polling response. Just do the math.

Impossible returning voters from the previous election were required to force the exit poll to match the recorded, official vote counts in four elections. The impossible returning voters were ALL Bush voters. What does that tell you?

I don’t get your point. If more Republicans/Conservatives willingly choose to take polls, then how come the Democrats always do better in the polls than in the official vote count. What you are saying makes no sense. The 7-8% “Red-shift” from the Democrats in the poll to the Republican in the vote is pervasive. It has occurred in every election. I showed you the numbers. The one-sided shift indicates fraud beyond any doubt.

I assume you are referring to Obama’s vote in 100% black precincts. Of course he could he get 100% of the vote. Blacks have traditionally voted 90% Democratic overall. With a black man running for president, one would expect that in many black precincts, he would get 100% of the vote.

It’s funny that you assume the polls are bad and the vote counts are good.
Here is a simple test:
Do you believe the recorded votes?
If so, then you do not believe in Election Fraud.

Do you agree with the exit pollster’s practice of changing unadjusted exit polls to match the recorded votes?
Do you believe that it is scientifically valid for the exit pollsters to adjust the polls to match the recorded vote?

If you believe the votes are miscounted and election fraud is systemic, then you must also agree that the unadjusted exit polls are essentially correct.

So which is it?
1) ZERO fraud: Exit polls are wrong, recorded vote counts are correct or
2) Systemic Election Fraud: Exit polls are right, votes are miscounted.

How about INCONCLUSIVE. If you have a VERY crappy measurement tool (exit polls) that tells you that a height of a person is 5’7” while voting results tell you its 5’10”, you can’t really know which one is correct or conclude validity of either one. I have no dog in this fight – except for fighting statistical ignorance and relying on numbers that are pulled out of the thin air that are not extrapolatable to anything (polls).

Inconclusive? Is that your answer? Election Fraud is inconclusive? The exit pollsters pull numbers out of their ass?

Yes, pollster adjustments made to scientifically designed unadjusted polls are pulled out of the pollster’s ass to MATCH THE RECORDED VOTE. You don’t seem to appreciate the ramifications of this absurd policy. It implies that ALL 274 recorded state elections from 1988-2008 were fraud-free and accurately depicted voter preference.

You are extremely naive to 1) ignore the exit pollsters policy of forcing a match to the recorded vote process and 2) deny the overwhelming mathematical proof of election fraud based on 274 state unadjusted exit poll deviations from the recorded vote from 1988-2008.

Only someone totally ignorant of polling methodology and mathematics would conclude that the 8% margin discrepancy in 274 state presidential elections between the average recorded vote (Dem 48- Rep 46%) and the unadjusted exit polls (52-42%) is INCONCLUSIVE.

Two points 1. Adjusting exit polls to recorded vote and not reporting un-adjusted exit polls is absurd. But. 2. Using unadjusted exit polls as ANY semi-precise indication/benchmark of a real vote is ignorant. It’s enough that Dems are a little bit (20%?) more likely to respond to a request from a stranger to share their personal information (including who they voted for, race, income and education if I am not mistaken) to explain all of the exit poll data without resorting to voter fraud. I indeed do not know the very nuts and bolts of this particular polling methodology, but I have a graduate level training in probability and statistics (from a top school) and can smell misuse of statistics and model errors from far away. I am not saying there is no voter fraud, but I am saying your models seem unjustified (EXIT POLLS ARE NOT RANDOM/REPRESENTATIVE SAMPLES) and sometimes it’s better not to know an answer than to be sure of the wrong one.

Your comments are nonsensical. Exit polls are random samples of voters as they exit the polling station. The polling sites are determined by stratified sampling. You have zero experience in quantitative analysis of exit polls. Dems are 20% more likely to respond? That is BS. Where is your proof? It shows your ignorance when you spout such garbage.

You can “smell misuse of statistics”? Be specific. That is a very arrogant statement which exposes your ineptitude. True analysts don’t come to conclusions based on “smell” . Prove it by going through the exit poll data and probability calculations in detail.

Are you up to it, Mr. Expert? I doubt you will even try.

What are your qualifications? Can you mathematically prove your statements? Of course not. They are mere words backed up with no factual evidence.

I use the best data available, I do not just make up shit like you are doing with your 20% figure that you just pulled out of your ass with nothing to back it up.
SHOW US YOUR DATA. SHOW US YOUR PROOF You won’t because you can’t.

I have analyzed and developed exit poll and related election models for 15 years. I compiled all the relevant historical data for my research. Where is yours? I have three math degrees. What is yours? You are spouting unqualified opinions – nothing more.

Do not bother to reply unless you can specifically refute the data and analysis.
And don’t forget: Cite factual evidence of your canard that Democrats are 20% more likely to respond to the pollsters.

A.S.

February 4, 2016 at 7:28 pm

Chill out and enlighten me on the exact procedure of the exit poll. My understanding is that AT BEST when choosing a person to approach, the pollster either uses a random clock, or approaches every k-th person exiting. If the protocol for approach involves any other “personalized/unstandardized” variables, who gets approached can depend on personality of the pollster (what is the distribution of party affiliation of pollsters/organizations running the polls?) and approachability of people which could vary between Dems vs Reps. This is a weak point because pollsters are lay unsophisticated humans who might be introducing subtle biases even under strict protocols, but suppose this step of the selection is solidly randomized.

Once a person is approached, the person makes a choice to participate in the poll by supplying private information (their vote and beyond) to a stranger. If the response rate is 100%, my initial point is moot. If the total response rate is X% (with Dems responding at X+a and Reps at X-a), then your effective sample will be X+a:X-a or, in other words, proportion of Dems is 1/2+a/2X. I have no actual data, but it’s not inconceivable (and needs to be tested for, but how would you test for the vote of the person who refuses to answer your questions) that a/2X is on the order of a few percent (upto 5?). You model implicitely assumes $a=0$. Any evidence for that?

It doesn’t matter what data you collected if your model is wrong/unreasonable/misses a difference in base rate responses. Using your logic, if you randomly approach people in the street asking for help and record sex of those who helps you, you can conclude sex ratio of the population. Newsflash – it will be heavily biased towards men.

I got news for you. The Exit Pollsters work for the Corporate Media – the National Election Pool of six conglomerates: Fox, CNN, Washington Post, CBS/NYT. AP. NBC. These guys fund the exit pollsters. You are making the gross assumption that the pollsters would bias the interviews to favor Democrats. YOU HAVE NO EVIDENCE OF THAT.

If that were the case, they would not have to adjust the exit polls to MATCH THE RECORDED VOTE.
ARE YOU CAPABLE OF COMPREHENDING THAT?

YOUR PREMISE IS BOGUS, YOUR CHILDISH CALCULATIONS ARE BOGUS.

You assume the pollsters do not know how to poll. You assume that 232 of 274 exit polls from 1988-2008 were biased for the Democrat.
The Democrats won the polls because they won the vote.

YOU ASSUME THAT THE POLLS ARE WRONG. THEREFORE YOU MUST BELIEVE THAT THE RECORDED VOTES ARE CORRECT.

THEREFORE YOU BELIEVE THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS ELECTION FRAUD.
THEREFORE YOU BELIEVE THAT BUSH WON IN 2000 AND 2004.

YOU HAVE NOT BACKED UP ANY OF YOUR STATEMENTS WITH FACTS AS I TOLD YOU TO DO.
THEREFORE, IT IS OBVIOUS THAT YOU ARE NOTHING MORE THAN A TROLL.
AND THAT IS WHY I WILL NOT LET YOU CONTINUE WITH THIS CHARADE.

YOUR COMMENTS ARE NO LONGER WELCOME HERE.
I DO NOT WASTE TIME WITH TROLLS WHO DON’T KNOW WHAT THE HELL THEY ARE TALKING ABOUT.
AND CANNOT SHOW FACTUAL EVIDENCE TO PROVE THEIR POINT.

You commented that even when Democrats win, their margins are reduced by voter fraud. Are you reading this to mean that these are attempts at voter fraud that are failing or that the voter fraud is designed merely to make the Democrats seem less popular than they are?

Perhaps you have no opinion on that at all, but for me, if all this means that in fair elections Democrats would always win and win big, I think it’s possible the intent is to prop up the GOP and make it look viable so their disaffected base doesn’t lose hope and start a third party (or join the one that already exists – ie libertarian 🙂

This kind of second and third order speculation doesn’t seem to be your thing, but if you do have an opinion, I’d be interested.

First of all, it’s election fraud, not voter fraud.
There are a number of reasons:
Can you explain why Obama’s 61-37% lead (30 million vote margin) in the 2008 National Exit Poll was reduced to match the recorded 53-46% (9.5 million margin)?
This was obviously not polling error. It was an attempt to steal the election – possibly combined with an apparent attempt to reduce his overwhelming margin.

Can you explain why Kerry’s 52-47% lead (6 million vote margin) in the 2004 National Exit Poll was reduced to match the recorded Bush 50.7-48.3%?
This was obviously not polling error. It was an attempt to steal the election.

Can you explain why Kerry’s 62-36% lead in the 2004 NY Exit Poll was reduced to 58-40%?
This was obviously not a polling error. It was an attempt to pad Bush’s national popular vote.
Bush knew that he would never win NY. But he needed to inflate his bogus recorded vote margin.
He could not afford a repeat of 2000 when he lost the popular vote to Gore by much more than the bogus recorded 540,000 vote margin.

Thank you for the reply and the correction–election fraud, not voter fraud–an important point. I acknowledge widespread election fraud, I am just not sure it’s as simple as stealing elections from Democrats–the idea of a two party system is important to the power elite–I think they need to keep the GOP alive… as Carroll Quigley famously said, “The argument that the two parties should represent opposed ideals and policies, one, perhaps, of the Right and the other of the Left, is a foolish idea acceptable only to the doctrinaire and academic thinkers. Instead, the two parties should be almost identical, so that the American people can “throw the rascals out” at any election without leading to any profound or extreme shifts in policy.”(Tragedy & Hope)

They steal the elections for the GOP to maintain the illusion of a 50/50 electorate. Otherwise the Democrats would never lose and we would not have a viable “democracy”. But the fact is: they steal elections. The Dems and Repubs are two sides of the same coin. It’s an illusion. And it works. The dumbed-down public is clueless.